Page 81 of The Locksmith's Promise

Hands tight around my hips, he buried his face in my soft stomach and sucked in a harsh breath.

This big man I’d been in love with as long as I could remember, this man who’d been larger than life since he was a kid, trembled at my feet.

My hands fell to the back of his tawny head, tunneled into his hair, and held him as he pulled himself together.

“I wish,” he rasped, swallowing audibly. “I wish I’d seen you swollen with him.”

A small sob broke from my lips.

Sitting back on his heels, he dragged my panties down a couple of inches and traced the silver streams across my tummy with gentle fingers.

“Are these from him?” Looking up at me, his dark eyes snagged on my heavy, aching breasts before I could answer.

Reaching around, he filled his hands with my ass. “Maggie, baby, so beautiful.”

Slipping my panties down further, he pressed his face to the apex of my thighs and breathed deep. “I missed you, fuck, I missed you so much.”

My chest heaved. Pulling in a shuddering breath, I fought to steady myself. “I missed you too,” I admitted. “Every day, I missed you.”

Nodding against me, he pulled my panties down the rest of the way, steadying me with a hand at my lower back as I stepped free of those as well.

His palms dragged up the outside of my legs from my ankle to the top of my thigh where the lacy edge of my nylons halted.

With my pudgy thigh puffing over the top, I hadn’t planned on him seeing them from that angle. Especially not up close.

Wrapping his arms around my thighs, he pressed his hands to the insides and kneaded the plushy flesh at the top at the same time as his tongue snaked out and swirled over my clit.

“Baxter,” I gasped, legs shaking, imperfect thighs forgotten.

He moaned low in his throat, pressed his face closer, and licked every inch he could reach.

When my legs began to shake, I pushed his head away. “Come back up here.”

Leaping up, he wrapped his hand around the back of my neck and plundered my mouth.

I cried out at the force of his kiss and the erotic taste of my essence on his tongue.

Frantically yanking his shirt from his pants, my fingers danced over the buttons of his shirt as I flicked them open.

“My turn,” I uttered throatily,

Parting his shirt, I pressed my palms to the hard planes of his chest before dragging them down over his abdomen. My thumb traced the thin, dark brown line of hair dipping under his waistband.

His body, too, had changed. Thicker and more muscular with coarser hair dusting the hard muscles of his chest.

His head fell back. “Your hands feel too good on me, Maggie.”

Trailing my hand across his stomach, I pressed a kiss to his heart and circled behind him to drag his shirt off his back.

He followed me with his eyes, muscles tensing as his head swiveled to keep me in his sight as long as possible. “Maggie,” he began.

Running my hands over his shoulders, I grasped the two sides of his shirt and pulled it down and off, freezing at the sight that greeted me.

“Maggie,” he clipped, shoulders going rigid.

“It’s okay,” I murmured, pressing my lips to the centre of his back and fighting back tears. “It’s okay,” I soothed once more, controlling the tremor in my voice as I licked a path up his spine.

His head fell forward. This time when he said my name, he uttered it like a prayer.

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